


i couldn't get the boy to kill me

by orphan_account



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-09
Updated: 2011-07-09
Packaged: 2017-10-21 04:55:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/221159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charles dies on a beach.</p><p>That isn’t precisely true. Charles was always prone to hyperbole.</p><p>But it’s true enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i couldn't get the boy to kill me

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Richard Siken's "Little Beast".

They are in the study, because they are always in the study. Charles and Erik, spoken fast, slurs into one word that the children speak, smirking as they say, “CharlesandErik are playing _chess_ again.”

But they _do_ play chess, that is all they do. Or, more, Charles pontificates on the nature of life and death, the nature of humanity, and Erik listens, amused tolerance humming at Charles from his head. They’re at the cusp of something, and they know it, so they’re savouring, savouring the flex of hand over a bishop, the way Erik watches Charles with his eyes half lidded and his mouth wry.

Charles can hear him, can’t keep him out, Erik’s thoughts battering through every defense he’s carefully cultivated, so there is Erik’s desire, and there is Erik’s hate, and there is Erik’s fear, small and curdled but always, always present. Charles doesn’t know how to shake it out of him, and he shouldn’t, even if he wants to. Erik without fear would be a monster. Erik with fear is edging towards it, but he is redeemable, he can be redeemed.

So Charles makes the world the way he wants, sculpting it out of thoughts and words, and Erik watches him and waits for whatever is going to happen. It will happen soon, they both know it, but they can wait.

*

It is the night before apocalypse. The word has been ringing in Hank’s head, and Charles finds it maudlin, but apt, total annihilation present like the tap of a hand on their shoulders. It is the night before apocalypse, and Charles knows what people do before a battle, has read on it, like he has everything, has seen it in the minds of soldiers and sailors, all boys once.

The cusp spills over into tonight, where Erik’s jaw is tight, his eyes unamused, cold in a way that even Charles can’t pull him from, but he tries to, he’s always trying with Erik, and always failing, but he likes that, a little, likes that there is something he cannot do.

He’s been told he’s arrogant. That’s probably true, but he knows he can’t do this, knows that whatever happens, Erik is not asking for repentance, Erik doesn’t want to be saved. Of all the things Erik is sorry for, his sins are the least of it.

So it is with that, with the four horsemen lathering their steeds, that Charles stops playing the game, stops trying to think a move ahead of Erik, peeking into his mind like a pervert. That night he takes Erik to bed, and this isn’t winning, they’re not winning, Erik unbridled rage, sorrow, and Charles just trying to hold on.

*

Charles dies on a beach.

That isn’t precisely true. Charles was always prone to hyperbole.

But it’s true enough.

*

There is a night, on the cusp of things, that beautiful moment where everything is possible, everything is achievable, and there are no repercussions to face. There is a night.

Charles is lecturing, because that is what he does, he lectures, and Erik is listening, sort of, keeps getting distracted by the wave of Charles’ hands and the bow of his mouth, which Charles can’t muster any ire about.

“What is it,” Erik asks, when Charles is winding down, distracted by Erik’s thoughts, cheeks flushing in a sort of pleased shame, “that you want from me?”

Charles is entirely unsure how to answer the question, and then he knows, he knows the answer, but it isn’t something he can say.

*

Charles doesn’t die. He goes on, because that’s what people do, he’s learned, they suffer and they suffer, and if it doesn’t destroy them, they go on. But they’re all broken inside, he can feel the edges every time he touches someone, the places where they fell and they got back up despite the fact that there was nothing left of them but shards.

He hadn’t understood it, before, how someone could die one day and then just keep moving, like they didn’t know they were dead. But they do, he’s learned, they know they’re dead. They knew it all along.

Erik was dead the moment he met him, the moment he saved him, an impotent sort of gesture, in hindsight. Erik was dead, and he knew he was dead, and maybe that’s the reason why he looked at Charles like that, mingled affection and dread, Charles appearing bright in his mind. Maybe it had nothing to do with Charles in particular, maybe it was just that Charles was still alive.

*

But that isn’t fair, and that isn’t true. Erik loved him the best he could. It’s just that Erik only knew how to break the things he loved, and Charles was never an exception.

*

What Charles wanted from Erik was everything. Wanted to wipe him clean and take the pain away, wanted to pull smiles from him unprompted, wanted to remake him into something happy, and present, and whole.

The scary thing is, he could do that. The scary thing is, sometimes, he could hardly hold back. Perhaps Erik had the right of it, breaking Charles before Charles could remake him.

*

Charles can no longer feel his legs, which is horrible. Charles can no longer hear Erik’s thoughts, shrapnel he’d never been smart enough to dodge.

That is immeasurably worse.

*

On that night, that final night, the only night, Erik falls into uneasy sleep because Charles wills it, smooths a hand over his brow, gentle and coaxing. Erik will angry about it in the morning, as if it would be better to face the day shaking with exhaustion.

Charles is shaking with exhaustion. He has no reign over his own mind, so that night he watches Erik sleep, watches the inhale and exhale. It is remarkable, how every man looks innocent while they sleep. It is remarkable, that face, that body, that broken mind, all coalescing into something simple. A man asleep. How very peaceful he looks.

He didn’t look like a man willing to commit genocide, but perhaps no one ever does.

*

There is a night, there is a night where it all happens, where they break, hands and mouths and desperation, the only night. There is a night where Erik shoves his way into Charles like he wants to destroy him from the inside out, and Charles blinks back tears and holds onto him hard enough to keep him, for the moment at least.

Charles thinks, dimly, _be gentle with me._

Somewhere in Erik, the answer is _no_.


End file.
